Logitech left looking for new boss

Peripherals vendor Logitech is looking for a new regional manager for the Middle East after officially communicating to channel partners that Ahmed Khalil is leaving the company.

Partners have been informed that a replacement will be appointed shortly and will join the existing two members of staff operating out of the firm’s Dubai office.

Khalil — who is understood to be joining PC vendor Lenovo in a senior sales position — has been with Logitech for less than eight months. He was recruited to grow the company’s Middle East coverage and strengthen weaker areas of its business.

At the time, Katharina Tarmann-Droescher, director of Eastern Europe and Middle East at Logitech, described Khalil as a “perfect” appointment. “We’re delighted he is able to represent the company at this important time and look forward to seeing the business develop under his leadership,” she stated.

While Logitech probably wasn’t expecting to repeat the search for a new regional chief quite so soon, one UAE partner believed Khalil was “overqualified” for the job given his previous roles in the industry.

Another channel source also said that after a long and successful spell as Toshiba’s Middle East chief, it was not a surprise to hear of Khalil’s return to the PC and notebook sector: “If you look at the PC market it’s a business of US$200m or US$300m against several products, and if you compare that to Logitech it’s probably 180 products across 8 models of notebooks and maybe one tenth the business.”